President Obama said in his second inaugural address that if America is to solve its problems, Americans must act collectively - the right message for Stockton as well.

"For the American people can no more meet the demands of today's world by acting alone than American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with muskets and militias," the president said.

That's actually a clever rhetorical swipe at the NRA and Second Amendment crazies. Hey, when you win re-election, you can do that while loftily calling for unity.

Seriously, America faces globalization, income inequality, debt, soaring health care costs, crumbling infrastructure, a changing Mideast, a war in Afghanistan, a rising China. And these challenges cannot be mastered by a country divided.

The city faces bankruptcy, foreclosures, unemployment, poverty, illiteracy, austerity, soaring crime, fraying infrastructure and a far-from-assured change in its public employee culture from a self-enrichment society to public service.

Many of these issues have been woefully divisive. The city is like Washington in this regard.

The city's spending spree during the boom created a segment of resentful citizens who felt redevelopment ignored them with its elitist priorities (see: Wall Street).

The crime crisis deepened this disconnect, as many came to believe City Hall was indifferent to their real, immediate neighborhood dangers.

The city's fiscal meltdown divided city management and public employee unions into warring camps.

The compensation enjoyed by public employees divided them from a general public compelled to make sacrifices.

Crime frightened many into withdrawing into safe zones while residents of dangerous neighborhoods were left to hit the floor when bullets flew.

Many of Stockton's schools fail to make students proficient in mathematics and language, thus perpetuating an underclass that returns to haunt the city.

Obama said America doesn't need to agree in every particular. It needs to act, collectively, to tackle its problems.

He made it clear, though, that a precondition is "a basic measure of security and dignity" for all Americans.

Surely this goes for Stockton. A city can't straighten out its flawed institutions if a large part of the citizenry is afraid to enter its front rooms for fear of stray bullets.

It can't realize its potential - and Stockton, for all its Gandalf-level wizardry at generating bad publicity, boasts great potential - if Johnny can't read.

It can't soldier through bankruptcy and emerge fiscally solid and with good government if public employees hold a grudge or refuse to accept the new normal.

Or flourish if natives begrudge immigrants opportunity.

Or if knee-jerk neighborhood activists blame police for everything.

Or if educated citizens turn away from civic initiatives, like the soon-to-be unveiled Marshall Plan to fight crime, out of disaffection with City Hall or because they feel safe behind gates.

Ultimately it's in everybody's interests to act collectively - because that's the only way big problems are solved. But neither a society nor a community can act collectively if the preordained outcome is to leave many behind.

Obama made it clear that conservatism is a core asset to America. "Our celebration of initiative and enterprise, our insistence on hard work and personal responsibility, these are constants in our character."

But it alone is not enough. "We understand that outworn programs are inadequate to the needs of our time," Obama said. "So we must harness new ideas (and) remake our government ..."

In Stockton that means remembering our history as a city of diverse, risk-taking rowdies willing to forge a new community based on daring dreams and shared aspirations for a better life.